Using sea surface temperature measurements from microwave and infrared satellite measurements

The Tropical Rainfall Mapping Mission Microwave Imager (TMI) instrument Sea Surface Temperature (SST) product (v1.0) is compared with in situ observations obtained in the Atlantic Ocean. The TMI SST has a mean warm bias of 0.25 K +/- 0.7 K when compared to in situ SST at a depth of 7 m. When TMI SST are compared to in situ skin SST measurements, the bias is 0.6 K +/- 0.5 K. A limited global comparison between TMI SST and co-incident ERS-2 Along-Track Scanning Radiometer (ATSR/2) skin SST demonstrates a bias of 0.6 K +/- 0.6 K consistent with the result obtained using in situ observations. These results are consistent with the predicted accuracy of the TMI SST data products. Based on these results, a simple method to merge the TMI and ATSR data is proposed.